Discussion on the First Picture of Earth
Date: 23 Aug 1966

Former Langley Center Director Floyd Thompson shows Ann Kilgore the "picture of the century." This was the first picture of the Earth taken from the vicinity of the moon.

From Spaceflight Revolution: "On 23 August 1966 just as Lunar Orbiter I was about to pass behind the moon, mission controllers executed the necessary maneuvers to point the camera away from the lunar surface and toward the Earth. The result was the world's first view of the Earth from space."

This image was called "the picture of the century' and "the greatest shot taken since the invention of photography." Not even the color photos of the Earth taken during the Apollo missions superseded the impact of this first image of our planet as a little island of life floating in the black and infinite sea of space.

Credit: NASA